The Race to Indigeneity

Three Vexations in Filipinx Diasporic Politics

Abstract

In this paper, we trace and track the ways in which Filipinxs in the diaspora in British Columbia mobilize conceptions and claims of Indigeneity. We argue that this race to indigeneity is enacted through situating diasporic Filipinx-ness in relation to the Philippine nation-state and its colonial histories and through acts of accessing of indigenous ways of being as part of diasporic subject positioning. We argue that these practices pose problems for conceptualizing the geography of Filipinx diasporic politics vis-a-vis British Columbia, and the Canadian nation-state more broadly. Through examples drawn from our embeddedness in and engagement with Filipino Canadian communities on Coast Salish territories, we point to three vexations of this race to indigeneity. First, the invocation of “Indigenous” as a “homing device” offers a way of situating oneself vis-a-vis certain idea(l)s of Filipinx homeland and culture, but one that, we caution, reduces indigeneity to certain sensory signs (sights, sounds, and smells) that can serve to essentialize and objectify what it means to do and be “Indigenous” in the diaspora. Second, and especially salient in relation to the racial politics of queer geographies, we argue that it is crucial to query the basis of these diasporic claims to Indigenous queerness as a way of thinking through the very construction of indigeneity itself. Third, we point to the fact that diasporic claims to indigeneity in the settler colonial context of British Columbia are a reminder of Filipinxs’ statuses as participants, as diasporic subjects, in longer histories of Indigenous dispossession, including on Coast Salish territories. This offers an opening towards a collective examination of accountability, of allegiances to particular geopolitical orders and the possibilities of complex solidarities with peoples on whose lands the diasporas take place.